what am I doing wrong - layer masks

OK, in some of my photos this is how I work. I click on layer and do a background copy, then darken or lighten my image as needed, then click layer mask then hide all. Then I click on my brush and brush what I want. For some reason I can't get it to do this. The brush does nothing. Everything is set to 100%. I'm doing it the way I have always done it in the past.

Am I doing something wrong? Could something have changed last time I used photoshop and I somehow messed it up? Maybe I'm having a brain fart and just am skipping something and not noticing?

Any suggestions?

You need to make sure that you're working in the layer mask, not on the layer itself.

Also, the brush needs to be white to reveal on a black layer mask.

You can see what you're doing on the mask itself if you alt+click the layer mask.

omg can it really be that easy?????!!!!! I've NEVER noticed that the brush has to be white. Have I really just lucked out that it's always set to white when I'm doing this? That is some serious fate there!

Man i feel stupid!

Thanks a bunch!!

No, it doesn't always need to be white, but in this case, it was probably black so you didn't see any change.
Be sure to keep track of the Opacity option at the top of the screen, too.

Do yourself a favour and stop duplicating the layer. Whatever you're doing to darken or lighten your image can be done using an adjustment layer.

Damo77 wrote in post #12464856
Do yourself a favour and stop duplicating the layer. Whatever you're doing to darken or lighten your image can be done using an adjustment layer.

The masks in Adjustment Layers are one answer to make changes to just a part of the image. Post #9:
Airport runway shoot